Mirrors and Mass: Wayne Thom’s Southern California

USC Philip K. Wrigley Marine Science Center, 1970

Catalina Island, CA
1970
Pereira and Associates

The USC Philip K. Wrigley Marine Science Center is a research and teaching facility on Catalina Island. The Science Center was built after the Wrigley family granted the university a 14-acre plot of land on the island. 20 miles by boat from Los Angeles and located on a part of the island removed from Catalina’s tourist center, the Marine Science Center is a perfect place to conduct research on California’s sea life. In one photograph, Thom depicts the building as an almost foreign element in a desolate, arid landscape. In some ways, the image is more about the wild cacti, a deep blue inlet, and expansive sky that the diminutive building, fixed firmly in the middle of the picture plane.

References:

USC Dornsife, USC Wrigley Institute for Environmental Studies, history, web.

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